Here's mine . . .

Title: Bound by Family
Cast: Harrison Ford, Kurt Russell, Kevin Costner, Jamie Lee Curtis, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Jean-Claude van Damme
Producer: Jerry Bruckheimer
Screenplay by: Tom Clancy
Music Composed by: Jerry Goldsmith (in one of those irritating scheduling conflicts should arise, I'd go with Elia Cmiral)
Plot: When their FBI agent brother and his family are brutally murdered, four ex-Special Forces siblings (Ford, Russell, Costner, Curtis) seek revenge on the Russian drug lords (Arnold, van Damme) responsible for the killing.
Rating: "R" - for excessive violence, multiple gun battles, and extreme action

So pitch in. What would you "the-sky-is-the-limit" production be?

NP: Jurassic Park - "Dennis Steals the Embryo" ***/***** (Not one of Williams's best scores, but it has it's moments)

THE SPEED OF DARK: WW2 movie (I am hesitant to give up much of the details here)

Directed by: me

Written and produced by: me and the other Rocco (he doesn't post here; for all I know Hatfield will get into the mix as well, he seems to be someone I could work with, and he wants to get into the biz)

Director of photography: Setsuo Kobayashi (if still alive and working; otherwise, we can pick and choose between Darius Khondji, Andrew Laszlo, William A. Fraker, Gerry Fisher, Conrad L. Hall, Peter Hannan, Emmanuel Lubezki, Kozo Okazaki, the choices are endless. The Japanese cameramen are picked partly because I need to shoot at least some of this in Japan. Although I suspect that we'll have to pick up a lot of it somewhere else, perhaps Canada. Japan no longer looks anything like it did then. You can NOT aim a camera without finding a power line. I think I would not pick a native Japanese cameraman for another Hollywood picture, the language thing would just get too irritating. On the other hand, Yoshifumi Hosoya is a great cameraman and a splendid fellow, and his English is decent, but he seems to have jump-started his own directing career, at least according to the IMDb. No, you probably never heard of him, but I worked alongside him on the American picture COMBINATION PLATTER. I got to do grunt work.)

Music: Akira Ifukube or Jerry Goldsmith or John Williams or Christopher Young. And if none of those four were available, I might give a lesser-known name a shot: Elia Cmiral perhaps, or the vastly underrated Terry Plumeri, or hey, who knows, Aaron Collins.

Editor: Richard Francis-Bruce, perhaps. Jerry Greenberg? Dov Hoenig? Charles Bornstein? I think editing is really the director's job, and whoever I wind up hiring for an editor will be just whoever I get along the best with, which is the key.

Production Designer: John Muto or Bo Welch or Wynn Thomas, who knows. Again, this is a question of whom one gets along with. The designer actually starts work with the director before the cameraman does ... the cameraman can be almost incidental to the process. (Underline "CAN" be.)

Costumes: Not my specialty. Off the top of my head, Eiko Ishioka, who did such great, Oscar-winning work on BRAM STOKER'S DRACULA, and would have easier immediate access to the kind of historically accurate archives I would need to make this thing look right.

Cast: Here you've got me. There are any number of underregarded (in the West) Japanese actors I'd like to put in this one, but I'm well aware that the picture needs to be carried by younger American actors. Matt Damon and Brendan Fraser come to mind. (This is one of my few scripts that actually is skewed towards a younger cast -- my characters tend to be cranky middle-age-weathered types a la Robert Forster, Lance Henriksen and William Smith. There's a prize cameo at the end for the right older American actor, and I need a real icon to help sell the moment, but I haven't set my heart on one or the other ... it's better not to do that, in this business.)

NP: THE STORY OF OSAKA CASTLE (Akira Ifukube) just ended); now into WHALE GOD (also Akira Ifukube)

NP: The Phantom - "The Tomb" *****/***** (from the extremely underrated movie of the same name)

Heh, given the cast you've assembled, it'd probably be 300 million before you shot a frame ... why not throw John Travolta and his entourage into it, just for good measure!

The majority of the films that I DO want to make are fairly low-budget flicks, and the actors/actresses I want to work with on a lot of them are not big-name, A-list stars. I've already learned that's one way to keep the budget down. Why hire someone for $20 million when you can get someone just as talented for $600,000? They do exist, and that's not to say I wouldn't want to direct Ford or Russell. I'd love to work with them, together, on the same film.

Yes, my intention was that Ford, Russell, Costner, and Curtis were all siblings. Perhaps Don Johnson could play the brother who's killed.

I actually have an idea for a movie that I would love to have Ford and Russell in, not as brothers, but still working together nonetheless.

Actually, imagine if they had combined Air Force One with Executive Decision. WHAT A CAST! Ford, Russell, Gary Oldman, Steven Seagal, Glenn Close. And I'd throw Michael Dudikoff in just because I've enjoyed his work for years.

NP: The Rocketeer - "Main Title/Takeoff" *****/***** (my all-time favorite Horner score, and the only one in which I cannot detect any rip-offs. If there, let me know)

Ford and Russell would be interesting as brothers (is that your concept? You've got Costner in there too. I always thought he and Don Johnson looked uncannily like each other. Curtis seems like precisely the kind of sister who'd grow up with such a bunch.)

Now that I think about it, there's an even more insane and esoteric Japanese-related project I'd like to do, perhaps this is more important to push than the action picture, since I think that'll be RELATIVELY easy to get financed. No title as yet (in my head I call it EVERYTHING CAME BUT THE BATTLESHIPS, a reference absolutely none of you are going to get, but that's awright) -- this isn't an action picture, it would star Bruce Willis and ... not sure who the younger-actress flavor-of-the-month is going to be, but I suspect that's how it'll have to be cast. When I first came up with it, it was Winona Ryder; today it would probably be Angelina Jolie. By the time we get around to it, I'd bet even she'll be too old. (I am not being ageist here, the character just has to be a certain age or else the whole thing goes out the window. Hey, I'll flip it: I'm not even sure Willis is OLD enough NOW for it, but by the time we get around to it, perhaps.)

NP: see above - "Jenny" just came on (I don't think this track appears anywhere in the film. HEY! I think I just detected an early hint of Titanic, which still doesn't make this a rip-off score. Titanic has to be a rip-off of every Horner score he's ever written, eh?)

BAND OF BROTHERS from Spielberg and Hanks ... is that yet another WW2 thingie from them? (It must be from the Stephen Ambrose book ... if it WAS Stephen Ambrose, I never read it, but I've read other works of his, I may or may not be right here.)

I'd contribute but I'm trying to get filmmaking OFF my mind just for a little while. I am editing a 16mm short I made and it's taking an age. Sucking the life out of me totally! Can not wait for the days when I can sit back in a chair and just direct editing situations to a pro on an Avid.

If it were MY project (the following is all pie-in-the-sky stuff; I understand VERy well the reluctance to share Ideas That Could Actually Have Merit in such an open forum):

Title: CORRIDORS

Director: the underrated and unemployed Mark Hatfield, esq.

Screenplay: the director can also write, a little. MUCH "polishing" by Herman Romanov Rocco.

Cast: absolute nobodies for the key roles; in support/"character" roles, I MUST work with Christopher Walken, Bruce Dern, James Woods, Michael Keaton, and Jeff Bridges. Budget, shmudget. I'll shoehorn them in somehow.

Director of Photography: Dean Cundey

Music: Goldfarb.

Sound: Ben Burtt.

Producer: Debra Hill

Synopsis: In the not-too-distant future. The often-hysterical leanings toward "New Age" and alternative medicine at the end of the 20th century proved to be a catalyst for enlightened (and scientifically-verifiable) advances in healing, most notably in the treatment of disease. With the aid of a fabulous device, certain empathically-enabled people can project their lifeforce/soul into a patient, invigorating the host & halting - or eliminating - even the most dreadful diseases. Not everyone is entirely ethical, though, and this process also opens the door to brave new tortures and murders. Sometimes, there are too many people in you already......

The movie would cost too much and make too little, ensuring me of Legendary Director status. Harlan Ellison would sue on General Principle (if he hasn't already written it, he sure MEANT to....); and the creative team behind DREAMSCAPE would take up residence in my living room, waiting for that cup of coffee I owe them.

Screw it. I'll be an agent.

NP: Nothing at all. It's TWO-THIRTY IN THE MORNING, DUDES!

PRINCIPLE PHOTOGRAPHY - CAUSE & EFFECT - DAY 1

The day of anticipation is here. It has been a tough road just to make it to this day, but here I am. I write this at 8:30 am and, in 8 hours, I'll begin getting the set ready. I expect a crowd of about 50-80 people to be there...mostly extras...it is a party scene (well, a 4-1 party scene...4 themes representing four different parties) that I am shooting, both digitally and with stills, meant to provide flashback and cutaways to a happier time for one of the characters. I have been lucky enough to get the full cooperation of my brothers in the Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity. They have been great!! Of course, it helps that one of my actors is an active brother who lives in the house (the only one who nailed the role he read for the moment he opened his mouth in auditions!!) and that I am an alumni. The pressure is on me...I have a high standard in which to live up to...as I am repeatedly reminded...David McKenna, the writer of American History X, is an alumnus of this particular chapter. I am thrilled that they think I can live up to this...I am terrified that I won't be able to.

I mentioned earlier about how this has been a tough road getting to Day 1. Well, as most filmmakers will attest to, nothing ever goes as planned. I have had to contend with several interesting and challenging incidents, one of which is still giving me a hard time. The easy one was perhaps the most frightening! My lead actress, Amy Rae Berman, was bucked off her horse a few weeks ago and landed hard on her face and arms. Luckily, nothing was broken, although she did get 17 stitches around her right eye and numerous scrapes. She has mended well, and I have assured her, and assured her from the beginning, that no other actress would ever be considered to replace her. Aside from being an absolute sweetheart, she is also quite professional. She was a tad concerned about how her scars might present a slight problem...I made it clear that I could write her accident into the script if necessary, in my mind providing more fuel for her insecurities. I could see her smile across the telephone cable. This most recent dilemma is, while nothing quite so dramatic, is nonetheless, to me, much more disturbing. One of my main actors has missed several rehearsals and, in fact, was called out of town at the last moment for a photo shoot in Oregon (it is a paid gig and it is for a national magazine, so I cannot blame him in any way). However, I have had to reorganize my entire shooting schedule around this and my faith in his commitment to the project is teetering on collapsing. I have decided to get another actor to prepare for the role, in case he has another sudden job he must go to. I have decided that I will NOT postpone shooting anymore. If he can't do it, I WILL find someone who can. This concerns me as the people he intereacts with have grown accustomed to his mannerisms and inflections and will have to deal with something entirely new to them if I do decide to replace him. I need to speak with him tonight...IF he shows. If he doesn't...well...the credits will be a changin'...I mean, it's not like he is a peripheral character...there IS no such thing in this script...

Poor Aaron Collins. Aaron, as many of you may know, is scoring my film and we have already discussed several directions I want the music to go in. Well....as I sit here, I've gone through about five different scores temping particular scenes that I haven't even shot yet...thinking to myself...THIS is the tone I want. THIS is the tone I want. Horner's Apollo 13 has been used, Newton Howard's Sixth Sense, Elfman's Dolores Claiborne, Kilar's Ninth Gate, Ottman's The Usual Suspects...I guess the great wisdom of this is that I will just have to wait until the edited version is done and get the feeling for how the actors have portrayed the scene and THEN make a decision on the tone. Until then, poor Aaron is gonna keep getting me going, "Whatcha think of THIS?" I do not envy the job of the composer. I can only hope I am not as horrible as Ridley Scott is. I can promise all of you though that Also Sprach Zarathustra will NOT be making an appearance...and neither will The Blue Danube.

Hopefully, I will be able to get a copy of the teaser poster for the film up on this site soon, if it isn't already. I have submitted it to PeterK and await his decision and remarks...

...anxiously...as this is the state of mind I will no doubt be in for the next few months.

NP - I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER (Debney)

as if this is going to help me relax....

Title: The Lord of the Rings (without a doubt)
Cast: Jeffrey Combs (as Wormtongue), Kenneth Branagh (Faramir?), Sean Connery (Gandalf), Terry Farrell (Arwen), Harrison Ford (Aragorn), Ian Holm (Bilbo? ), Ian McDiarmid (Denethor?), John Rhys-Davis (Gimli ), Brent Spiner (as Saruman), Christopher Walken (Sauron's Mouth) (Hm, only one woman. There are several female actresses on my mind, but I just realized how hard it is to cast LOTR's female roles...)
Music: John Williams or Patrick Doyle. Maybe both: Williams score, Doyle songs.

Anyway, it sounds like you need a film music consultant. The heck with temp-tracking, have faith in the composer! But just in case--please, please, please, PLEASE fly me to San Diego & let me be your (very) amateur consultant. I've always wanted to be a film music consultant! But if worse comes to worse, however, I recommend you get the Twilight Zone scores. They are very diversified and you could probably pick and choose the feelings you want the music to capture or create or enhance, etc. etc.

Get technical on me here man. What stock are you using? What are you shooting in, 35mm? Budget? Gimmie spice!

I remember shooting this last 16mm flick I did, actors never showed. Did they tell us they wanted out? Nah, they just never showed, so we stalled for a couple of weeks trying to cast new people. Arghh, some people take filmmaking for granted....

I've said before my flick is in editing stages, we already have a small theatre booked to show it if we decide to go do a 35mm blow up print. But as much as I love editing, it can be a plain old bitch. Using a bloody steenbeck so it's all hands on. Took us 2 weeks to sync up the rushes!

Dan (UK)

[This message has been edited by Dan Brecher (edited 14 April 2000).]

Re: the maddening editing process, with which I am somewhat familiar -- is it that difficult -- whether because of cost, or because you have limited access to them -- to work on the AVID system? (I'd like to own one just to play with it.)

And I agree, JOE: at least tell us what you're shooting on (I bet it's 16mm?)

To edit we're using a steenbeck editing table. It's touch because I am physicaly handling the reels of film, cutting, splicing...etc...etc so we are always worried about damaging the print somehow. In honesty it is not THAT important, this is simply a project so I can learn techniques of 16mm filmmaking, and I am lucky I am able to do so at such an age.

I've also had the forune to work at Pinewood studios a couple of years ago, and also work on a 35mm short film.

This is great fun though, tricky, but fun. I have no doubt this is my goal in life, this is what I want to do!

quote:

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Originally posted by dantoris:
I noticed you chose several talented English actors: Branagh, Holm, Rhys-Davis and such. What about David Warner? I think he's an excellant actor. And Paul Freeman. You know, Belloq from Raiders of the Lost Ark.

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Hm... Paul Freeman could be the southlandish guy who betrays the hobbits in Bree. But in fact, "Raiders" was the only occasion where I've seen him so far, so I can't really tell which role fits him best.

As for the original question:

FILM: Shardik
MUSIC: Goldenthall
PLOT: Epic story of a man who devotes himself to what he sees as the manifested power of God in the great Bear Shardik. His Empire will suffer the most heart-rending of consequences when Man tries to twist religion to his own ends. Based on the novel by Richard Adams.
RATING: R -- lots of fighting, but the real reason would be the brutal portrayal of child slavery -- it makes "Temple of Doom" look like "School House Rock."

Title: Legacy of the Wizard
Based upon the 1988 Konami video game (sort of... more like I'm starting from it... like jumping on Michael Jordan's head to reach the basket for a slam dunk)
Genre: Adventure, Sword&Sorcery, Eye Candy
Plot (loosely; I'll have to make a few adjustments so that it's not just a rehash of every other S&S movie): Long ago in a forgotten age, an evil dragon terrorized the land with devastation and an army of terrible monsters. Anyone who did not fear for their life was already dead. But one day a wizard fought the dragon and trapped it deep underground. Generations later, the decendents of the wizard are living a peaceful life until one day, their pet (nice) monster Pochi (who happens to look like a more menacing version of Jigglypuff) comes home with a shiny, armor-like object... a scale. Soon after monsters that had been docile are turning hostile and attacking villages. It is unmistakable; the dragon is rising again. It is now up to the family of decendents of the wizard to stop it... Xemn, the father, Meyna, the mother, Lyll, the daughter, and Roas, the son, aided by the grandparents Jiela and Douel. But before they begin their quest, Douel reveals a stunning secret. Before the wizard died, he created a magical sword, one strong enough to pierce the great dragon's thick scales (in the game it is called the DragonSlayer, but I would obviously never use that name in the movie). The only one who can use it is the firstborn son of the family... Roas. The sword is hidden by four crowns, and have a profound connection with the ancient princess Celina. The family must now begin their quest to discover the secret of the four crowns and find the magical sword before the dragon rises again.
Cast: Roas...I have no idea. Recommendations? I need someone who actually looks like/is a teenager, not a Dawson's Creek/Buffy teenager.
Lyll...Tina Majorino.
Meyna...Julianne Moore
Xemn...Liam Neeson
Jiela...recommendations?
Douel...John Rhys-Davies
Celina...Liesel Matthews
Pochi/special vocal fx...Frank Welker
Uncast cast (actors/actresses I have created roles for that do not appear in the original game/story): Jeffrey Combs, Matt Frewer, Alyson Hannigan, Lance Henrikson, Malcolm McDowell, Chris Sarandon, and (oh yes) David Warner.
Music: Don Davis? or Trevor Jones? or a collaboration between Richard Band and Chris Stone?
Cinematography: Sergei Kozlov
Writers: Me & Jeff Zimmer
Produced and Directed by: Me
Rating: PG or PG-13... I'm not sure how graphic the battle scenes would get.

Also...
Books or stories I would like to adapt:
Arena by Fredric Brown
Come and Go Mad by Fredric Brown
Pi in the Sky by Fredric Brown
And Then There Were None (a.k.a. Ten Little Indians) by Agatha Christie... four screen adaptions and they still haven't gotten it right
The Rats in the Walls by H.P. Lovecraft
Lucifer's Hammer by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle
The Mahabharata traditional Indian epic

James
NP - "The Gardens of Loch Mair" by Bill Douglas (****1/2)

quote:

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Originally posted by H Rocco:
Marian, you MUST have remembered him in THE OMEN, TIME AFTER TIME, STRAW DOGS, THE BALLAD OF CABLE HOGUE and MASADA (hmm, lots of Jerry titles here) ... the fellow is indelible.

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Ouch! Of those, I've only seen The Omen!
It's hard to see many movies from this period in Austrian or German TV. When you miss one of them once, you'll have to wait a year or longer until it's played again.

Hope you didn't think I was yelling atcha, Marian.

Also, there was an episode called "Showdown," which showed one of Al Ghul's adventures in the Old West. A bounty hunter was after him, and that character was voiced by Malcolm MacDowell, who played H.G. Wells in Time After Time, which co-starred David Warner as Jack the Ripper.

(Geez. It started to feel like Six Degrees of David Warner there for a second.)

Also, there was an episode called "Showdown," which showed one of Al Ghul's adventures in the Old West. A bounty hunter was after him, and that character was voiced by Malcolm MacDowell, who played H.G. Wells in Time After Time, which co-starred David Warner as Jack the Ripper.

(Geez. It started to feel like Six Degrees of David Warner there for a second.)

quote:

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Originally posted by H Rocco:
Hope you didn't think I was yelling atcha, Marian.

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Help! Help! I'm being repressed! Come see the violence inherent in the system! Violence inherent in the system!

TITLE: War With the Newts
PLOT: Based on the book by Karel Capek, mankind discovers a race of intelligent, human-like newts (stop snickering, it's not a comedy!). Mankind proceeds to exploit the newts, so successfully that the newts learn enough skills and arms to challenge mankind's dominance.
CAST: Michael Caine, Jonathan Price, Christian Bale (all I could think of right now)
PRODUCERS: Scott Rudin, Andrew Niccol, Edward S. Feldman, and Adam Schroeder (The Truman Show)
SCREENWRITER: Andrew Niccol
MUSIC COMPOSED BY: Michael Nyman (I would say Carter Burwell or Jon Brion, but I don't know how well they pull off battle sequences)
CINEMATOGRAPHY: John Toll
RATING: PG-13 or R because of the violence the humans treat the newts later in the story and in the newts' uprising.

As for the budget, I have no idea. CGI I know has to be used to make the Newts look realistic (suits would be out of the question, they'd border on ridiculus).

Bruce Campbell
Kurtwood Smith
Jeffrey Combs
Andrew Divoff
Tony Todd
Charles Napier
Ron Perlman
Miguel Ferrer